The politics of tech responsibility: Understanding companies’ responsibility as representative claims

Abstract

This article explores responsibility claims by private tech companies. While the business literature has extensively discussed the notion of corporate social responsibility, it does not fully grasp the political significance of responsibility claims. This article proposes a novel conceptual understanding of responsibility by drawing on the concept of representative claims. It argues that by claiming responsibility for an issue or a community, companies are claiming to act on behalf of someone or some purpose—while avoiding democratic oversight. Thereby, responsibility claims not only provide reputational benefits but help companies legitimize and demarcate their political role. Empirically, it uses a representative claims analysis to compare responsibility claims of three companies—Meta, Microsoft, and the NSO Group. Companies either embrace, reorient, or refuse responsibility but frequently define the criteria to measure it. This article thus contributes to our understanding of the political significance of responsibility and tech business power.